speaking of Worldcat

Slow reading points me to the Not in WorldCat blog, showcasing weird funky and obscure books that you can’t find in one of the many libraries Worldcat covers.

Worldcat.org is the public face of the largest combined (or “union”) library catalog in the world. Library folks usually refer to it as OCLC (Online Computer Library Center). Currently OCLC/WorldCat catalogs over 1 billion items from over 60,000 libraries around the world. This blog is not affiliated with OCLC/Worldcat in any way. It’s just an outlet for one bookseller/librarian (me) to feature unusual, rare and interesting items that exist outside of WorldCat’s vast reach.

2 Responses to "speaking of Worldcat"

The items not in WorldCat could fill another WorldCat, most likely. While explaining the OCLC database to a German researcher friend the other day, it struck me how it is still very, very Amero/Anglocentric. Sure, there are many non-North American libraries represented, but they are still a trifling compared to the massive amounts of cataloged material still undocumented in WorldCat. Too often, in the US, the criticism of the OCLC database focuses on titles in the NUC that never made it to the new age. They, too, are trifling compared to the data in catalogs in scores of countries ‘undiscovered’ by OCLC.